Massachusetts Unemployment Rate Rises Slightly to 6.7% in December

According to the Massachusetts Executive Office of Labor and Workforce Development, the Massachusetts unemployment rate rose slightly to 6.7 percent for the month of December. The jobless rate has slowly risen since May of 2012 when it was at 6 percent. The state’s current unemployment rate is down compared with the rate one year ago when it was 6.9 percent in December 2011. It also remains lower than the highest rate of the Recession, which was 8.7 percent, in October 2009. The national unemployment rate was 7.8 percent in December.